Debate on Evil and Atheism Perspectives

Well, today on the programme, I'm joined by Frank Turek. He's a Christian apologist, speaker and radio host and author of books including I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist and Stealing from God. He was on the show a few months ago talking to David Smalley. He was the atheist guest then. Today, it's Alex O'Connor returning. He's the atheist YouTube channel Cosmic Skeptic. It has over 100,000 subscribers. He's appeared on the show a couple of months ago to debate the fine tuning of the universe. Well, today I've got Frank and Alex joining me in studio. Frank has been in the UK doing some speaking dates. You can find out more about him at his website, crossexamined.org. And Alex, as I say, Cosmic Skeptic is the YouTube channel he runs. Back to debate with Frank today, because Alex released a video a while back critiquing a YouTube video by Frank. Now, Frank's video is titled, It May Just Be That Evil Disproves Atheism. Well, actually... Alex had a critique to make of that and we're going to be hearing what Alex's response is and that's really the subject of our discussion today. Does evil prove that God exists? That's the claim in a sense that Frank Turek makes in this video, something we've discussed before but I think we're going to be doing it from some unique angles today and I'm really looking forward to today's conversation. So Alex and Frank, welcome along to the programme. Thank you for having me again. Yeah, wonderful being here in person, Justin. Well, it's lovely to have you in person, Frank. We've had you on the Skype a little while back earlier in the year, talking about your new book, Stealing from God, and as I say, in debate with David Smalley. And so it's lovely to actually have you in person. When I heard you were coming to the UK, I wanted to make sure we could connect. Well, thanks for having me on. And, you know, I just had you on my program for your new book. Yes, indeed. I'm flogging it far and wide. Uh-huh. It's a wonderful book, Justin. I won't let you leave without a copy as well, by the way, Alex. But yeah, thank you. Well, it's very glad that you were able to endorse it as well, Frank. But you're here to talk about yourself really today and your ministry and obviously some of the videos and books that you've written yourself. How long have you been kind of involved in the sort of apologetics ministry you've established? Well, we established a ministry in 2006, but I went to seminary from 1993. I was on the Moses Plan. It took me 80 years to get through. I'd been speaking for quite a while prior to 2006, but we started in 2006 with crossexamine.org, primarily to go to college campuses. Because, as you know, the college campus is a breeding ground for skepticism and agnosticism and atheism. So we wanted to go there and present evidence as to why Christianity was true from our book, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. And some of the most popular videos actually that go on YouTube that you produce are actually some of your interactions with some of the students on these campuses. And I think that's people like to hear the kind of the to and fro in a way. Right. And you're very good actually at thinking on the spot and responding in those situations. Well, actually, you don't have to do much thinking because you hear the same 20 questions over and over again. I mean, there are the standard objections, which are good objections. In fact, the evil is a good objection that Alex brought up. So it's. It's good to try and unpack these things in more than two minutes, which is why I appreciate this show so much, Justin, because, look, I can do a two-minute video, Alex can do a two-minute video, and you're really not going to cover the topic adequately, but when you have a program like this, you can really interact on it. Well, it's a pleasure to have you with me, Frank. And again, the most recent book you've authored is Stealing from God. Do you just want to quickly give us an encapsulation of what you can find in that? Sure. The book Stealing from God, the subtitle is Why Atheists Need God to Make Their Case. The book's not about tithing Christians. That's not what it's about. But I've noticed, it seems to me, that atheists are stealing aspects of reality that would only exist if God existed in order to say he doesn't exist. And we have an acronym in the book, CRIMES, and each of the letters stands for a different aspect of reality that I think atheists are stealing from God to say he doesn't exist. One of them... The E in there is evil, and that's what we'll talk about today. I think, as we'll see, that evil actually shows God does exist rather than he doesn't exist. Okay, well we'll obviously be digging into that in the course of today's show. Lovely to have you back, Alex. Lovely to be here. And I'm in awe because you're actually, and I don't know how you get away with it really, but you're midway through your exams at the moment, and yet you've made time to come in and record a discussion. And these are, of course, A-level. exams as well. You're a relatively young person, but wise beyond your years, I think. You did a fantastic job last time you came in debating the fine-tuning argument, so I thought this would be fun to have you back in. So, first of all, exams going okay? They're going as well as they could be. I guess your exams are going fine because I was pretty much familiar with most of the subject matter already, so I could kind of get away with not revising for that one. Well, that's Good. Obviously, I guess you interact with philosophical ideas quite regularly on your videos anyway. I do try. So it's a good way of getting into it. And the Cosmic Skeptic channel, as I mentioned last time, only been going about a year, but already you've over 100,000 subscribers. That's right. What's the secret to your success? Like I said last time, if I knew, I would do it again. They're all fantastic. Every one of my subscribers, at least the ones that I interact with, are incredible. Very willing to consider different ideas and I get messages from people of all faiths saying that they're grateful for a voice that isn't just Isn't just castrating religious right? Yeah, but is going in there for a discussion not to defend a worldview But to well, I was really encouraged actually when we had the discussion last time here in the studio that you were very You you've reached out to atheists and said we need to have these discussions. We can't just you know, poo-poo and dismiss religion and the claims we need to engage in an honest conversation, which is certainly what this programme is about. Well, I mean, humour and ridicule has its place. But if you want to make a change, then you have to take things seriously, I think. Well, thank you very much for coming back on the programme today. And part of the reason I asked you, of course, is because you regularly respond to other online videos that are out there. And, of course, one of the ones that you've responded to is one of Frank's videos. And, as I say... That video was titled, It May Just Be That Evil Disproves Atheism. So we're going to get into that in the course of today's programme and why you disagree with Frank. There's a number of issues that you develop from the video. We won't play the audio of the video this time. Rather, we'll let you explain for yourself. But some of the things that we're going to try and tackle is, at the outset, you say you can't disprove atheism. It's not a belief system. We're going to be talking about objective morality. Why would it be grounded in the Christian God, not something else? You also talk about the evolutionary or social... adaptation type of view of how morality came to be and other issues. We'll see how much time we have in the course of the discussion and I'm looking forward to a really good conversation. Well let's maybe start with you Frank just to lay out, you know, briefly at least what the case is that you're making on the video that Alex was responding to. Right it's a two minute video and I say in the front you can't cover this whole issue in two minutes but my main point is this is that if evil exists then good must exist. And in order for good to exist, God must exist. Because by definition, what we mean by good is the nature of God. That's what goodness is. So you can't have evil unless good exists because evil is a privation or a lack in good. Evil is like rust in a car. You know, if you take all the rust out of the car, you got a better car. If you take all the car out of the rust, you've got nothing. In other words, evil only exists as a parasite in good. And so I think we all agree evil exists. The question is, if evil exists... then how can it exist unless there's a standard of good? And good won't exist unless God exists. So evil doesn't disprove God. Evil may prove there's a devil out there, but evil doesn't disprove God because there'd be no such thing as evil unless there was good, and there'd be no such thing as good unless God existed. Now, the second question there, of course, is, okay, well, if there is a good God, why would he allow these evil things to occur? That's another question which we spend a lot of time in in the book Stealing from God. But my main point is that if evil exists, God exists. I know it sounds counterintuitive. It does sound counterintuitive to the average person. They'll say, how do you get from one to the other? But as I understand it, this is the idea of what's often called the moral argument for God. If we all agree that real right and wrong exist, real good and evil exist, then there has to be some kind of a moral lawgiver or some kind of reference frame beyond just the... material universe that a naturalist perhaps believes. In fact, C.S. Lewis famously said that as an atheist, my argument against God was that the universe seems so cruel and unjust. But how would I got this idea of justice and injustice? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? You see, injustice can't exist unless justice exists, and justice can't exist unless God exists, because again, by definition... That's what we mean by justice. And so it's your view that if an atheist wants to claim that justice and injustice exist, well, they can't really because that's just, on their framework, an illusion, a kind of just a sort of something that we've come up with as a sort of helpful way of thinking about things, but not something that actually exists objectively. Right, typically. And I think that's what Alex said in his video, that it's an illusion, that this idea that we have these moral, objective moral values is illusory. Well, let's come to Alex for this. We'll try and sort of take the points that you raised in the video in a kind of sequential manner as far as possible, Alex. I mean, let's start at the beginning, because in the video, the first point you wanted to make was that there is this question mark around disproving atheism. That's obviously the title of the video. It may just be that evil disproves atheism. You have a problem with that very concept to start with, don't you? To an extent, yeah. It's not particularly pertinent to the discussion. But I think it's important to remember that, according to me, atheism isn't a worldview. And I know this is something you disagree with, Frank, but the way that people get around this a lot of the time is they'll say, Well, Many atheists do believe that there is no God, but not all atheists do. So if you meet a person who does believe there is no God, they are an atheist. But that's not what atheism is. That's sort of a subset of atheism. I'm what you might call an agnostic atheist. And a lot of people think that agnosticism and atheism are on the sort of same spectrum, but to me they're absolutely not. Agnosticism, Matt Dillahunty is good on this. Agnosticism is a claim to knowledge. Atheism is a claim to belief. So to say you're agnostic is to say, well, I don't know. if there's a God, which I think is the rational position to take. I mean, can anybody really know for sure? And all I'm saying is because I don't know agnosticism, I therefore don't believe, and that's atheism. But there are people out there who do actively believe there's no God, and those people do have a burden of proof. I mean, people such as, he only did it on one occasion that I've seen, but Christopher Hitchens usually would say, you know, we would never say there is no God. But when talking to William Lane Craig, he said of the Christian God that he's... Quite dangerously, I think, but he said that he's in a position where he thinks he can actively say that God does not exist. And in that case, yes, he has a burden of proof. But as far as I'm concerned, atheists in general or atheism isn't a worldview and doesn't... Isn't something you can therefore disprove in that sense. Yeah, in the sense, and also atheism, one of the phrases that I've heard you use, Frank, is on atheism, if atheism is true. But to me, atheism isn't something that can necessarily be true or false any more than, say, veganism. You know, is veganism true? It's not really a case of whether it's true or false. It's a case of the tenets on which you are grounding this veganism is perhaps maybe you think it's wrong to eat animals. That can be true or false. But not objectively, I'd say. That can be true or false. But then to say, is veganism itself true or false? That doesn't make any sense. It's not whether it's true or false. It's are you a vegan or are you not? Yeah, well, I would say that if... Are you saying that atheism is just a lack of belief in God? It is for me, as far as I'm concerned. Okay, but then that would be just a statement about your psychological state. It wouldn't be a statement about the real world. Because this book is an atheist then, because it lacks a belief in God. But then we're really trivializing what the word atheist means then. Because you could say any of this microphone is an atheist then, if it just lacks a belief in God. So if somebody wants to say that, okay, fine, but I don't see atheists just saying that. What I see is atheists saying, oh, I lack a belief in God, and here's how I explain the universe. Multiple universes, evolution, quantum vacuums, materialism. Well, those are positive beliefs that need to be defended. In other words, you just can't say, I lack a belief in God, and therefore I have no burden of proof to have a conversation about why reality is the way it is. Now if you're going to say that multiple universes or evolution or materialism or quantum vacuums explain how we got here, then it would seem to me you'd need reasons for those. Those are positive beliefs. You see what I mean? Oh, absolutely. In certain cases. For instance, if you're talking about the variety of life, and somebody says to me that they think it was God, and I say, oh no, I can explain this for evolution. I suddenly have a burden of proof. I have to offer some evidence for that. But atheism in general, if you're just an atheist and you're not taking part in debate, I think you don't necessarily have to justify your position in the same way. What do you do with the problem that that makes cats and rocks and microphones atheists as well? Well, it depends on your definition. For instance, if we define a vegan as someone who doesn't eat meat, then this book is also a vegan. Right. Yes. But isn't that the point, that that makes it difficult to understand what the content is of such a point of view? I think it... It's something which applies to humans. You can call a human an atheist. If you want to call a book an atheist, then be my guest, because by my definition, an atheist is someone who does not believe in God. And so a book, sure, call it an atheist if you will. But then we wouldn't have any reason to converse about anything. If you're just saying you lack a belief in God and I don't have any burden of proof to explain reality or why reality is the way it is, then we're not really having a conversation, right? Well, there's two types of atheist... speakers, you might say. The first is people who will have a burden of proof, who come out and there are two people trying to prove their opposing worldviews against each other. In the other case, there's somebody like me who, in the face of certain aspects of Christianity, I've found to be not particularly compelling or particularly... I'm trying not to use moral terms here, to be very careful. And so what I will do, my mission isn't... He's very smart. My mission is not to come out and convert everyone to atheism. It's rather to say, well, here's a belief system that I don't agree with, and here's why. I'm then leaving it open. Perhaps if I'm debating with a Christian, I might say, well, this is why I think Christianity isn't true. Now go and do your own thing. Maybe you want to be a Muslim. Maybe you want to be an atheist like me. Let me ask you this, though. Let's just say that you say you think Christianity is false because of X. whatever that is right sure aren't you implying that non X then is true not necessarily again it's a it's a very subtle distinction between believing there is no God and not believing there is a God it sounds like the same thing it sounds like we're being pedantic but really in all honesty it is a semantic thing it doesn't particularly matter because for instance what we're discussing today the idea of evil proving or disproving God I don't think it particularly matters how you're defining atheism or Christianity because what we're trying to talk about is a particular concept. And so for this discussion, I might just be a sceptic, not necessarily an atheist, but I might just be somebody who you are trying to present a worldview to. And I'm just saying, well, let me criticise that and see if I can get some kind of response. When I've had this conversation on Twitter and on this show with people, sometimes what's emerged is that they will say, you know, they'll go with that atheism is just a lack of belief in God view. But then when you press them a bit, they will come out with other things that they do have positive beliefs about. So that there is no such thing as objective moral right or wrong. The universe has no purpose. All that exists is matter and motion ultimately. And those kinds of things. So do you subscribe in that sense to something like, for instance, materialism, naturalism and so on? Well, for me, it's a case by case basis. So I wouldn't call myself a naturalist. I wouldn't call myself a materialist because all of a sudden you're giving yourself. a burden of proof. What I would say is if you pressed me to put some money, I'm not a gambling man, but if I had to put some money on either, say, Christianity or naturalism, a better explanation for the universe, I'd put my money on naturalism. And so when I have discussions like this, I will argue in that mindset. But I'm not going to say... But you're still agnostic effectively as to what exactly... If you're talking about a claim to knowledge, absolutely. I would never be so arrogant as to say that I know... that there is no God, or I would never say that I know that there is someone up there, and I know who he is, I know his gender, I know his nature, and I know what his plan is and what he wants from me. Yeah. Well, I think we're dealing more with probability than we are with absolute certainty. And you remember Richard Dawkins famously said this, on a scale of one to seven, where one is, I'm sure God exists, to seven, I'm sure there isn't a God. He said, I'm a six and a half. To his credit, he says, look, I can't say with absolute certainty there is no God, okay? Yes. So we're all dealing in the realm of probability. So where would you be on that scale? I'm in the same place as Dawkins. I'm a number six. He calls it a de facto atheist, which I think is the perfect term. For all intents and purposes. You assume there is no God for all intents and purposes. For all intents and purposes. What I would say is rather than I assume there is no God, rather I think that everything seems to work without the assumption that a God is there. But wouldn't an agnostic be about a 3.5? Agnosticism, again, is a claim to knowledge rather than to belief. So agnosticism, to me... If you don't call yourself an agnostic, then I can't quite understand what knowledge you have that I don't. I mean, I don't know if you're the sort of person to say, I know there is a God. Again, it's the realm of probability. Am I absolutely certain? No, I'm not even absolutely certain that I exist. You know, I mean, I guess I have to exist to say it. But I mean, we could be, you know, the famous thought experiment. We could... The universe could have been created five minutes ago, or an experiment in a scientist's laboratory, and you know, we just have all these memories. Well, you've got people like Elon Musk who do think that we're some kind of artificial intelligence. That's a discussion for another time. What I would say though is, I like to categorise it, and of course this is, again, semantics. It's just my way of categorising the world. What I would say is, if you think of four boxes, like a table, across the top you have theism and atheism, and on the side you have gnosticism and agnosticism. You say you're not 100% sure that there is no God, so I put you in the agnostic box. Then I put you across on the theism box because you believe there is a God, and that's where you sit. You're an agnostic theist, as far as I'm concerned. Now, you can reject that label because you might have a I know that the word agnostic carries weight, so you might not like that. I think maybe we ought to stop talking about labels and start talking about evidence. Absolutely. Well, maybe. Let's move it on. It's been a fascinating discussion so far, talking about the definitions of atheism and agnostics and so on. But, yeah, we should get into the meat of the subject today, which is the question of whether evil is evidence, actually, that God exists counterintuitively. That's the claim that you sort of sketched out for us earlier on, Frank. So let's move on to sort of the second issue that you bring up in your response video, Alex, which is, well, even if objective morality does exist, why would it be grounded in the Christian God and not something else? Do you want to just explain that out a bit and we'll see what Frank has to say? Well, again, this isn't... This is one of the parts of the video that I'm not really making an actual claim, but rather I'm a genuine question. More out of interest than anything is how do you arrive at the Christian God? Although I would say that I might assume that your answer might be something along the lines of, well, this argument just proves a God and then other arguments prove the Christian God, and that is fine by me. But I wonder... Do you think, if you say no to this, this doesn't disprove your position in any way, shape or form, but do you think that for objective morality it must be the Christian God? No, it could be another God, right? Yeah, you're absolutely right, and that's what I was going to say, that there are other arguments. You don't get all the way to the Christian God with the moral argument. Sure. But with other arguments, I think, in my opinion anyway, you arrive at the grounding for morality as God, and that God happens to be the Christian God. Let me put it the other way, I guess, to you, Alex. If... objective morality did exist, would it at the very least disprove atheism, which is actually what the title of the video is? Well, this is a tricky thing because... Or naturalism, let's say. Okay, sure. So we don't do that same discussion. Perhaps. It would be compelling. I would see it as a compelling argument. If you could prove to me that objective morality did exist, I would certainly consider it a good argument. It would, because naturalism would not be able to explain that phenomenon. Sure. I mean... Perhaps it would and we just don't have an understanding. But I would submit that yes, we do not have in our current understanding any way. Sam Harris has tried the moral landscape. What I found is that I don't quite understand what he's getting at. Because he says he wants to prove objective morality using science. But what he does is he proves that objectively speaking certain moral guidance leads to prosperous societies. But then that's assuming that prosperous societies... is a good thing. He makes the ought is fallacy, in my opinion. He assumes that what is, what science describes, is something we ought to be heading for. And of course, that begs the whole question of his project. Sure, I think he's a brilliant thinker, but on this issue, I just, I cannot bring myself to agree with him. Yeah, well, fair enough. I mean, I think we've more or less covered that issue, because obviously you're not saying this is... a wholesale argument for the Christian God, just part of a cumulative argument. Right, exactly. And that point in the video is more for people who were watching, perhaps, who were thinking along those lines. Sure. Well, look, that's a good point at which for us to take a quick break. I think it's time to grab the bull by the horns, Frank, and just, again, reiterate why you believe, first of all, that morality does have this objective nature to it, so that there is a real realm of moral right and wrong, good and evil, because fundamentally you're saying if... If evil does exist, as much as that may be a problem for why a loving God would allow evil, nonetheless, it's a signpost that something beyond the material world has to exist to allow this realm of good and evil to exist. In fact, I think Alex recognizes that signpost because on his website, he rails, I think rightfully, against some of the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church, where he talks about how priests have sexually abused children. And obviously... That's a great wrong. But my question is, Alex, if you really think that is a great wrong, why would you deny objective morality? I mean, is that really wrong or is it just a matter of personal opinion? Well, I think that we agree in one sense that evil doesn't necessarily disprove God. I'm with you on that. What I would say is, to answer your question, objectively, no. It is a subjective thing. Morality to me... isn't is entirely subjective why do you say that well because firstly a thing to note is that Objective morality well, let's let's talk about what objective actually means I suppose and objectivity to me If you want my definition would be to say and that it is true Regardless of human intervention regardless of human consciousness for instance the earth orbits the Sun that would be true if all humans disappeared Right every single one of them it would still be an objective fact, but to say that murder is wrong If every human disappeared, that couldn't still be wrong, surely. That would be a nonsense concept without some kind of human psychology. The only way that you could argue that perhaps it would still be wrong is if there was some kind of transcendent being. But then you need to have that being in order to prove the existence of the objective morality that you're then using to prove the God. What we're doing is we're reasoning from effect to cause, that we have this effect known as this moral law. That is pressing on us, as you admitted in the video. And look, videos, two-minute videos, ten-minute videos, you can't expound on all the nuances. So if this is wrong, correct me. But you seem to say that we, in fact, I think you quoted, the quote was, let me just quote you accurately on this. Because in the video, you said this. You said, moral truths are so deeply ingrained in us that they feel like they are objective. Yes. Right. Okay, so my question is why would you doubt their objective if they're so in deeply ingrained in well because? This is where I think Sam Harris is right in the sense that if you have certain assumptions So let's say that we could assume that Human well-being was a good thing. Well, we'll discuss why But let's say we assume that we could then say that is it is objectively true And that we should act in certain ways for instance trying not to murder people and that would then become an objective morality so because evolution has instilled within us through our through genetics a Drive to stay alive Then we can derive objective moral truths about how we should act in order and that complies with this inner nature Which I think has come about through evolution. So even if you're Even if you don't subscribe to the idea that certain moral actions such as not killing or not stealing have come about through evolution, the instinctual nature within us to stay alive causes us to think of those as objective truths. But it's a technicality. So for all intents and purposes, you could say they're objective truths. If you grab 100 people off the street and ask them, is rape wrong? 100 of them will say yes. But that doesn't mean it's objective. I mean, for instance, I put it to you. Would you say that chocolate is tasty? Yeah, I would, but that's a subjective... Right, sure. Some people may not like chocolate. It's subjective? Yeah, yeah. Oh, so... That's a flavor. So, tar can be just as tasty as chocolate. Mm-hmm. And that's no problem, right? Right. That's no problem whatsoever. So, when you say something along the lines of, oh, so morality is subjective, so what Hitler did being wrong was just an opinion. Well, yes. But in the same sense that chocolate tasting is good as tar. is an opinion, it doesn't make a difference. Well, no, I think it does because it's much more obvious that, say, sexually abusing children is wrong than atheism is true. Right. So why would you say that atheism is true in order to avoid the obvious conclusion that sexually abusing children is wrong? You already know sexually abusing children is wrong. Now, if you want to use an evolutionary argument, the problem is that undercuts everything you think. Because if everything we think is the product of evolution, the product of the laws of physics or biology, whatever it is, then why should we believe anything we think? Forget about morality for a second. Why should we even believe that atheism is true or that Christianity is true? If we're completely, if we're, sorry, I'm suffering from jet lag here. If our thoughts are the result of some random evolutionary process. Why should we believe anything we think is true? Well, the first thing is that evolution isn't a random process. But that aside, it's... Well, let me put it this way. It's either directed by an outside intelligence or it's not. Sure, okay. If it's not directed by an outside intelligence, then it's random. Yes, so? So, if it's directed by intelligence, then perhaps God exists. If it's not directed by intelligence... Why should we believe anything we think? Because, I mean, this is the old argument against naturalism that people like... C.S. Lewis. C.S. Lewis and indeed modern practitioners like Plantinga have put forward, which, as I understand it, is effectively saying if evolution, if effectively it's meant for the propagation of our DNA, it's not aimed at us receiving true beliefs. It's not aimed at us actually... It's not aimed at reasoning. And ultimately you could even go as far as to say that... the actual processes of matter in motion, atoms banging into each other, electrochemical processes, those are non-rational. Why would we assume that they produce rational thinking? Because ultimately, I mean, and your argument here, I guess, Frank, is it undercuts the whole project. It's this idea, it's almost sort of existential. You know, why should we believe anything if there's no guidance? To me, it's like asking the question, like you said earlier about, you know, how do we know that... we even exist or that the universe wasn't created last Thursday. For me, it's somewhat based on consensus. It doesn't prove it's true. But reason is one of those things that we need to assume in order to get anywhere. In the same sense, we need to assume that we exist in order to have a philosophical discussion. Now, that's a very wise point. I agree with you. The question is, how do we explain reason on a naturalistic worldview? Well, reason and consciousness can be explained as coming about through evolution. The way in which we sense the world... Let's stop there for just a second, though, Alex. If that's the case, why should we trust it? Well, we don't necessarily have to. Again, it's a subjective thing. But every single person... But that would mean reason's subjective. Yes, well, it is. Well, if reason is subjective, then... If reason's not subjective, then how do you and I come to different conclusions, both using reason? Because we have free will. If reason's subjective, we couldn't even communicate. If there weren't these objective, unchanging laws of logic... Well, yes, there are objective rules and tenets of reason, but reason itself is subjective in the same way that morality, you can say under certain assumptions, there are objective truths about morality. If you have... If you have a certain assumption about reason, then yes, there are objective tenets. Well, that's what I mean. These immaterial laws of logic that aren't made of molecules, how do we explain those on a naturalistic worldview? How do you mean? How do we explain? Why are there laws of logic? Why are there laws of mathematics? They're a product of consciousness. And laws of mathematics are not a thing in themselves, but rather a way to explain the universe. So the laws of mathematics would not exist without human beings, so they are subjective. But the things that they describe would on a whole so when you talk about logic when you talk about reason these things aren't ends They're means their means to understanding certain things so we use reason to understand that the earth goes around the Sun We use the laws of maths to understand how that happens, but you just said the laws of mathematics are human conceptions basic Yes, it's a language. Well. Let me ask you this Let's say there were no human beings on the earth, and they were just two rocks on the earth was it true There are two just two rocks on the earth well It turns what you mean by two I mean sure like you if In the everyday sense of the word. This is where things get confusing because, for instance, I suppose what you're asking is something similar to the question of does 2 plus 2 still equal 4 if there are no humans? And to me, the case is you have to think about what you're describing when you say 2 plus 2. So, for instance, if you're saying if there were two rocks and you added two more rocks, would there be four rocks? Absolutely. But to say that 2 plus 2 equals 4 is like... It's a... It's a good way to bring in the idea that mathematics is a language because in the same way that I can say but it's not An arbitrary language. Well, it is in fact language itself is based on mathematics and that's not arbitrary I'd say it's absolutely arbitrary Math is arbitrary. No math isn't but the language we used to describe it is it evolves and changes. Well, yes, but they're they're Referencing objective facts if we want to call this one book. Mm-hmm. There is only one book here Yes. Okay, that's an objective fact. If we wanted to call it einst, like in Deutsch, that this is one book, okay, that's a different word, but it's representing the same objective fact. And if we're going to say that reasoning is objective, then there's no way we can come to any conclusions about anything. There are different ways, even within the laws of mathematics. Did I say objective or subjective? I don't recall that. If we're going to say reason is subjective, then there's no way we can come to any conclusions about anything. But that's self-defeating, because when I say that, I'm making a truth claim. That if reason is subjective, then we can't come to any true conclusions about anything. That actually is an objective truth claim. Well, I would say that even with something as objective as maths, there are subjective ways in which to understand it, the language we use, even though it seems that it wouldn't be the case. For instance, if you want to find the... the roots of a quadratic equation, you can do it by using the quadratic formula, you can do it by expanding the brackets, and you get to the same answer. But the reason you're using to get there is subjective. So the answer is a fact of nature, it's true. That would still be the answer even if humans didn't exist. But the language we used to get there and the reason that we used to get there wouldn't. Yeah, but that's, no, the reason is objective, but there's different levels here. You have ontology, which is the study of being. Sure. Okay. You have epistemology, that's how we know the study of being. Then you might have semantics, which is how you describe the epistemology to get to the ontology. Sure. This can be arbitrary, but it's still tethered to objective facts. It's ultimately tethered to an objective ontology. So what are the tenets of objective reason to you? Well, start with the basic laws of logic that there. For instance, the law of the excluded middle, things like that. Law of non-contradiction, law of excluded middle, law of inference. Law of identity. Those are the essentials of the laws of logic. And you start with those, and then you use your sense perceptions to draw conclusions about the real world using those tools, those objective laws of logic. Exactly. They are tools. And this is the thing that I see when we're talking about whether reason exists. Reason is a method. And so it almost... It helps us in epistemology, but if they weren't tethered ontologically, if... If they weren't tethered to reality, there'd be no way we could know anything about reality. You're making the claim that this realm exists, that we call the laws of logic and so on, and that it really is something that we discover in that sense. It's an element of the reality we live in. We don't determine them, we discover them. Exactly. Whereas you're making the case, obviously, Alex, that we produce. It's something we invent because it helps us to reproduce. But you see, that's an objective truth claim right there. See, that's why it's self-defeating. Alex is saying it's objectively true that reason is subjective. And the same applies to the moral argument as well, which is you're saying there's this realm of real right and wrong, good and evil. And you're saying that these are just concepts we invent. We don't discover them, but we invent them. And I know many people who's part of whose journey to belief in God has been based on the fact that they came to. the view that there really is a realm of right and wrong that I discover. I no longer believe that it's all subjective. And obviously others who take your view as well, Alex. I mean, fundamentally, is that where we do? We just come to an impasse where you say, Frank, there is real realms of, you know, these objective laws of logic and there's real realm of good and evil. And you just say, no, in my opinion, it can all be explained as a subjective. Because ultimately, I believe in objective moral good and evil. Because for me. I see that as bit like I see racism is wrong is the same as one plus one equals two that but you say no that that racism doesn't exist when humans don't exist. I agree with you that I see it as the same to me they are both as instinctual yeah but that one plus one equals two is again it's a mathematical language but if you're talking in the set in the literal sense that one thing and another thing equals two things and yes that is objectively true but to say that racism is wrong Although it feels just as instinctively true, it doesn't have the same objective grounding in reality. Say you were living a few hundred years ago in the American South, and maybe racism is kind of just part of the culture, that's the accepted way of things, at least within the white population, let's say. Would, because that's the generally accepted, de facto, way of people thinking about it, would that mean racism is okay in that culture? Well, it's a difficult question. I would say no. If you dropped me in that culture, I would say no. But if you had grown up in that culture, you'd probably say yes, because it's subjective. You might find people who would argue that it is, and it is a subjective opinion. But I think now, because we have... It's not just a case that we've developed our understanding of morality. We've made it better. We now have a... But aren't you just... You're dropping in a moral claim there. You've said it is better, which suggests it's travelling towards something, an objective standard. I do admit I'm making the assumption that we are striving for... human prosperity, which is an absolute assumption. That isn't objectively good, but it's instilled with us within evolution. I can't explain why this thing is good, but it just, when I say good, I don't mean... At the end of the day, it's still just your preference. When I say good and evil, the words we use for me are just emotional translations of the words beneficial and detrimental. I like what Louise Antony said in her debate with William Lane Craig. Louise Antony is an atheist, but she admitted something about... morality and atheism that I think is very insightful. Here's what she said. This is her quote. She said, any argument for moral skepticism will be based upon premises which are less obvious than the existence of objective moral values themselves. In other words, here she is as an atheist saying, I have this sense of moral obligation that is so strong that any argument you give me for atheism or moral subjectivism will be based on the weaker premises. than just the sense that I have that objective moral values and obligations exist. So that was my question originally to you, Alex, is why would you deny the strongest belief that you have intuitively and adopt a weaker belief in atheism or agnosticism? I don't deny it because I don't deny, like I say, as long as I do have certain assumptions and I admit that there are assumptions, I can say that I have an objective sense that these things are wrong on the assumption that I'm aiming for human prosperity. Right, but you already pointed out that Sam Harris is begging the question on that. That is his, human flourishing. And that's a conflation of epistemology and ontology. And as you pointed out, rightfully so, at 18 years old, he's already figured this out, which I didn't know this was 18, that Sam Harris is confusing epistemology and ontology. He's assuming what he's trying to prove. But the problem with Sam Harris's argument is he's going in there trying to show that certain things are right or wrong. based on science. What I'm trying to do is say why people experience things as right or wrong based on science, which can be done. So I can say the reason that I feel that this is right and wrong is because of this. What I can't say is that this is right or wrong because of this. I mean, does this mean, is it a problem for you then, telling people what they ought to do? Because there's a sense in which, you know, if you see a society being racist or treating women Or Catholic priests abusing children like you do on your website, you say that's wrong? For me the problem has always been, for the atheist who denies objective morality, is what right do you have to tell someone else? Because they're just acting according to their subjective preferences. Well, the subjective preferences I find in these cases we often agree. So for instance, if I meet a member of the Ku Klux Klan, we can find common ground in the sense that I might say, okay, so why is this wrong? Why is that wrong? Why? Why? Why? Until we get to the final point and they say, well, I think that it's because my worldview is better for humanity. And I say, well, hang on, so do I. I think my worldview is better for humanity. So let's go on the assumption that what we want is to get what's best for humanity. And here's how I think my worldview leads to that. So even people... But if they say, but I don't believe black people are human... What do you say to that? Well, that's the thing. Then the discussion becomes trying to prove how they are. Right. You sort of remove the need for a basis once you find out what the basis of their beliefs are, once you find that common ground. For instance, me and you agree, you and I agree that, for instance, I assume that we would agree that human flourishing is a good thing. Oh, sure. But you would say that that's because... You have that in you because of God. I say that I have that in me because it's not just because it's in me, but because there's an objective standard of good outside of ourselves. And so when you say that we can agree that we want to have a better society, as Justin pointed out earlier, you're implying a best because in order to say something's better or worse, you have to imply a best. Well, what is that best? What is the ontological grounding of that? Not necessarily. You don't have to have. And this is this reminds me of one of. Thomas Aquinas'famous five ways, the degrees of perfection. There doesn't need to be an absolute perfection to have an idea of something which is more perfect than something else. And to your reference of C.S. Lewis... No, I think there would have to be a standard of perfection or a standard that you're aiming for to say you're getting closer to that standard or further away, better or worse. It's like your reference of C.S. Lewis. You can't know a crooked line without having some idea of straight. I don't think that's true. For instance, think of it this way. Why is it not true? It's not a case, if you're talking about good and evil. You don't need evil to know good. If you think about, say you have a flat plane. You're absolutely right about that. Think about you have a flat plane. You don't need evil to know good, I agree with you. You need good to know evil, though. I don't think so either. If you have a flat plane, you can see like a hill, like an indentation on that flat plane. Now, the rest of that plane is not a valley. You don't need the valley to understand the hill. You just need the hill. in comparison to what is neutral. So you can have evil compared to what is neutral. You can have good compared to what is neutral. You don't need the two extremes. What would be your definition of evil? My definition of evil? Well, that's a very broad thing. But if you're asking me, again, subjectively, anything I would say that unwarrantedly elicits human suffering or animal suffering to an extent. Okay, so that would imply that it's the opposite of human flourishing. So it's very difficult to define evil without reference to good. Not necessarily. It may be the opposite of human flourishing. flourishing but it's also just the absence of like of no of no no suffering not necessarily good but no evil okay I don't know if I'm getting my point across very well I know I think you're both doing a great job at representing your different sides I guess the the thing that I'm really interested in pulling out there just to bring us back to that racism example is uh oh can you sort of say that race you would you say racism is has always been wrong was wrong in every culture, time and place where it was practiced in the past. Can you not actually say that if you're a subjectivist? I would say if we're assuming that human prosperity is a good thing and by good we mean best for human prosperity, then yes, racism has always been wrong. Yes, but only on that assumption. Yes, of course, for the racist. Which is an assumption we all share, maybe not the racist. In fact, no, no, no, the racist does share the assumption that humanity, human prosperity is a good thing. They may not. They may think my own prosperity is the best thing. I want to live a selfish life that, you know, disregards other people's preferences. If we did have a racist. But the problem is, how do you, again, all I'm saying is, and I think you're agreeing with me, is simply that there's no objective way of sorting between these different preferences people have. There's no actual sort of thing that says this is the correct way. We should all be. wanting this human flourishing. It's a harsh reality. I don't like... There's no way of grounding that. It can make me uncomfortable, the idea that there is no objective, as far as I'm concerned, no objective way to... And so do you understand Frank's view here, which is he sees that as such an obvious thing that you would have to... The premises against that, if you like, would have to be much, much stronger than they are to take away his instinctive view that this is really actually an objective reality. I understand entirely. Think about hunger. hunger is with the within all of us yeah and it is such a strong thing we like if if somebody is is dying of starvation that is all they care about it is within them but it's still a process of evolution it's still a subjective psychological experience it's not some kind of hang on let me just ask you a question about that because it's Justin pointed out in his interview with Richard Dawkins a number of years ago, which is by the way in the new book. Unbelievable. I don't need a publicist when I've got Frank in the studio. It's a great book. Justin rightfully said, well you tell the story Justin, about how you said he was stepping outside of the evolutionary process. I kind of had this interesting conversation in my very first encounter with Richard Dawkins and I asked him Why, you know, whether if all our morality is essentially a product of undirected evolution, whether he can really say that rape is wrong. And he says, well, I do believe rape is wrong. Now, that may be a product of my evolutionary past, but that's a value judgment I'm going to make. And I said, but how do you make that value judgment? You have to step outside of this evolutionary process to say that's wrong. And he said, well, maybe, but it doesn't show that anything supernatural exists. And I said, but as far as you're concerned, the fact that we believe rape is wrong is as arbitrary as the fact we've evolved five fingers rather than six. And he said, yeah, basically. And I agree on naturalism. That is true. But most people recoil at that idea that our morality is essentially arbitrary. But in the same sense, this is what frustrates me about atheists a lot, is they'll do the same thing but the opposite. They'll look at God and they'll think of the evil. They'll listen to Hitchens talk about some celestial North Korea and they'll recoil at that and they'll say, that's a horrible thing, I can't imagine that reality, but I'm sorry. Just because you don't like a reality doesn't make it not real. And so if there are no objective morals, then unfortunately what Joseph Stalin did in the USSR was not objectively wrong. But that's not a shocking thing to say if we're under the assumption that nothing is objectively wrong. Do you understand then why for many people the moral argument is so powerful? Absolutely. Because they cannot get themselves to a point of view where those kinds of acts are only really about people's preferences. I don't think that's what Frank is necessarily doing. Because I think you're right that a lot of people do just recoil in horror at the idea of there being no objective standard. But I don't think that's what you're doing. I wouldn't, I'd say that you're being cleverer than that. You're understanding that yes, this is a bad idea. But more than that. You're saying that there's some way to prove that there is an objective reality, not just because you don't like it. I want to get beyond that, or maybe I should say underneath that, going back to Justin's point, and it's this. If you said this is all the result of evolution, you have to get outside the evolutionary process to believe that thought is true. Because if that thought is a result of the evolutionary process as well, why believe it? But again, it's existentialism. We have to have certain assumptions. What I'm saying, this isn't just an assumption. This is what we would call a properly basic belief. It's not just an assumption that I believe that torturing babies for fun is wrong. I think that's really true. It's not my assumption. Well, I would say that, for instance, my belief that torturing babies is wrong is also a belief, but that's a belief based on the assumption that human flourishing is a good thing. We're going to go to a break, guys, and we'll come back to this. Fascinating stuff today. and I hope it doesn't sound too much like it's two against one in this one, Alex. Not at all. But it's one where I've always found the moral argument a fascinating one because it does... Likewise. Whereas, I guess, cosmological arguments, they're about what's out there. I think this is very much about what's in here, our personal response to evil and good and so on. But anyway, great stuff. Does evil show that God exists is the debate today. Frank Turek and Alex O'Connor joining me in studio. Come back again in a few moments'time and we'll conclude today's discussion. I mean let's maybe just in the final minutes we have here gentlemen talk about one other issue you raised in your original video Alex. Morality often is blurred you say you know you raise examples of abortion and sexuality. These tend to be though questions involving humans and whether things bring harm or good along to them and there for you that showed you that ultimately the morality is human centric. It's subjective in that sense. This is my burden of proof. This is what I'm saying by it is simply that my, my, my argument in general is to say that, again, I'm not explaining necessarily why things are right or wrong, but why we experienced them as such. And certain places where we find moral ambiguity, ambiguity is such as issues like abortion. Like you say, the problem with, if you ask me, We're not deciding here, is it okay to kill a human life or not? The abortion debate is surrounded around, is that a human life or not? If it is, then it's wrong to kill it. And to me that's based upon the assumption of human flourishing, which again I think is instilled by evolution. So it seems to me that this assumption of human flourishing, that can be perfectly well explained through the evolutionary process, seems to be a very compelling grounding for the experience of morality, especially when you consider things such as these moral ambiguities. where they are based upon whether or not we're harming life or not. Same thing with animals. Yeah, again, I'd like to just reiterate that if the evolutionary process gives us our moral ideas, it also gives us all of our ideas, so why should we believe any of them? But secondly, not every issue needs to be crystal clear on morality for God to exist. You know, scientists disagree over aspects of the objective. world, but that doesn't mean there isn't an objective world. That's a difference between, again, epistemology and ontology. We all agree there's an objective world. We may not agree on certain aspects of that objective world in science. This is the very kind of conversation. I had a bit of a Twitter spat last week with an atheist. We were talking about objective morality, and one of the things he said was the fact that people disagree about morality means that That it is subjective. Yeah, see I don't buy into that. So you don't buy into that? No, not at all. Because that's often the assumption. If we disagree about something, it must be subjective. It's silly. It can be confused. I'm not trying to say that because we disagree on things, because people disagree on things like sexuality and abortion, therefore morality must be subjective. What I'm saying is that if you want to, if you are trying to propose the view that morality can be explained through evolution, this is bolstered. by the fact that the certain things that we do have moral ambiguities on seem to align with that. We don't discuss whether or not murder is right or wrong because, and to me the reason for that is because of the fact that it involves human flourishing, human survival. If the question is, will this act cause humans to suffer? Will this act cause a human to die in the instance of abortion? That's why that moral... that moral ambiguity exists. And so to me, the point is basically that this is evidence of an evolutionary basis for morality. Well, no, I would say, as you mentioned earlier, an abortion, if it is a human being, you don't kill it. That's not mysterious at all. The only question is, is it a human being? And I think scientifically we can show it as a human being. People just don't like that. I think many a times the reason people disagree on morality is not because they don't know the right thing to do. They just don't want to do it. In fact, there are some on the other side of the pond in my country who are saying now, yeah, we know it's a human being, but that's okay. We get to kill it anyway. There are even those who have proposed infanticide. You know, Peter Singer has made the case that because a newborn baby doesn't have any of the faculties that we develop as we go on in terms of our mental abilities and so on, they shouldn't be counted necessarily as having the same kind of rights for personhood that, you know, a three-year-old would have to say. Now, that's obviously, again... He's just shifted the issue into like, not whether we're human or not, but whether we have this quote unquote personhood issue. Yeah, this is, this is, I think, is perhaps one of the issues, perhaps, with proposing objective morality. Because what we're saying, with something like this, there's always going to be exceptions to the rule. For instance, when we talk about hunger earlier being a natural instinctive thing within us, there are people who are anorexic, there are people who are obese. There are exceptions. But that doesn't mean... that evolution can't explain how we experience morality. It doesn't necessarily mean that these things are right or wrong. This is the thing I think we're disagreeing on. I'm not saying because of evolution, killing a human is wrong. I'm saying that because of evolution, the reason that we don't want to kill humans can be explained. But... do you see or maybe i'm not explaining myself clearly alex do you see that if evolution has given you your moral beliefs it's giving you all of your beliefs including the idea that evolution has given your moral belief so why should you believe it it's either random on evolution or it's designed but so i mean is that if it's designed you can trust it if it's random you can't so again if all your thoughts are the result of the laws of physics why should you believe any of them i might be talking about my hind here but is is that not similar to saying um Well, the reason that you're saying the reason I got from evolution, I also got everything else from evolution, so why should I trust it? Well, the reason that you got from God, you also got everything else from God, so why should you trust God? Well, because God has given us the rational ability to make reasonable claims or discover truth about reality. Hasn't evolution given me the rational ability to uncover truths about reality as well? What's the difference? Because our minds are trustworthy if they're made in the image of the great mind. Why would they be trustworthy if they're a product of random forces? Well, how do you know it's a great mind unless the great mind has instilled that reason within you to reason that it is a great mind? Because I'm going from effect to cause. By using reason. Yes, by using reason. God gave you. So using the reason that God gave you to prove the reason of God. That God is the ontological foundation of the laws of logic, which allows us then to discover truths about reality. What I'm saying is that you seem to be doing the same thing as I am. You're saying God is giving you this reason to reason that God. is the most reasonable being. God has given us the tools of reason, which are objective, they're immaterial. And he's given us the free will to either follow him or reject him based upon what we learn about reality and whether or not we want to follow him or reject him. I mean, as I understand Frank's argument, it's again, it's one of those, what's the best explanation? We both acknowledge we are completely dependent on these laws of logic, this rational capacity we all have. Is it, does it... Can we explain such a thing on a naturalistic worldview or is it better explained on a theistic worldview? And obviously Frank's view is, yes, it makes sense that we would be able to trust our rational abilities if there is a rational mind behind the universe. Whereas in a non-rational universe, a non-rational process by which we came to be, there's no fundamental reason to assume that we are aimed at knowing. Right from wrong, truth and falsity. You do have to make certain assumptions. Like, it does frustrate me that I will never know if I exist. Yeah. That gets on my nerves, I have to tell you. Who's asking the question? It really does. It really gets on my nerves. Who's wondering, Alex? Precisely. This sort of stuff really gets on my nerves. But they are just unanswerable... Gets on whose nerves? What do you mean? Well, precisely. These are just sort of pedantic little things. that norway i don't think they're patented something like reason i i submit that okay you could make the argument that if reason comes from evolution how can we use that to then reason about evolution sure but i'm saying is that not the same thing with god no because god is a rational creature or not creature he's the he's the ground of rationality who gives rational because we're reasoning from our rationality back using the reason that came from where well of course his ontological nature is given us these Laws of logic to discover truth. How do you know that? Through reason. Right. You can't defend reason by reason because that would be circular. Precisely. Right. But what we're saying is once we have reason, what better grounds it? Naturalism, which couldn't explain the laws of logic to begin with, or a mind whose very essence grounds these laws. What you've just said is you said, okay, so we assume that reason exists. What's the best grounding? When I give you a grounding, you then say, but how do you know that reason even exists? How can you say that reason exists if it's just a process? So I could put the same thing to you. I could say, if reason does exist, what's the best grounding? And you say God. And then I could say the same thing and say, well, if you're getting that reason from God, how can you use that reason to then prove God? Because that's how you prove anything. Right. That's how you prove evolution. Again, again. No, no, no, no, no. Because in evolution, everything is predetermined. There is no free will. We're just the result of the laws of physics. No, not everything. God is omniscient. He knows the future. How can there be free will? Because knowing the future doesn't mean he's causing it to occur. Well, is he not causing it to occur? He's the primary cause. Now we're getting to predestination evolution. I don't know if we're predestined to get to this point. That's another show we'll have to come back to. No, no, no. I'm not a five-point Calvinist, if that's what you're saying. Not at all. Let's leave it there for the moment. Before we open up too many more. big topics. I think we'll have to agree to this. As we often do on this show, as we often do. Look, guys, I've really enjoyed the conversation. Oh, it's great. Thank you so much. And you are a gracious combatant. Alex, thank you for coming in again to do that. Frank, great, great stuff from you as well. If people want to find out more about you, crossexamine.org for Frank and, of course, the book, Stealing from God. Alex O'Connor, he can be found as Cosmic Skeptic with a K on the YouTube channel he runs. And hey, I think this will turn into a video as well at some point as well. Perhaps, yes, I'd like to think so. Great, well thank you both for being with me on the show today. Really great to have you on. I look forward to maybe getting you guys together again at some point in the future, but for the moment if you want to get in touch we'll be giving you the ways to do that again in a moment's time here on the show that brings Christians and non-Christians together and we'll be hearing some of your feedback to recent programmes. Great, thanks guys.

He was the atheist guest then. Today, it's Alex O'Connor returning. He's the atheist YouTube channel Cosmic Skeptic.

It has over 100,000 subscribers. He's appeared on the show a couple of months ago to debate the fine tuning of the universe. Well, today I've got Frank and Alex joining me in studio.

Frank has been in the UK doing some speaking dates. You can find out more about him at his website, crossexamined.org. And Alex, as I say, Cosmic Skeptic is the YouTube channel he runs. Back to debate with Frank today, because Alex released a video a while back critiquing a YouTube video by Frank. Now, Frank's video is titled, It May Just Be That Evil Disproves Atheism.

Well, actually... Alex had a critique to make of that and we're going to be hearing what Alex's response is and that's really the subject of our discussion today. Does evil prove that God exists? That's the claim in a sense that Frank Turek makes in this video, something we've discussed before but I think we're going to be doing it from some unique angles today and I'm really looking forward to today's conversation. So Alex and Frank, welcome along to the programme.

Thank you for having me again. Yeah, wonderful being here in person, Justin. Well, it's lovely to have you in person, Frank.

We've had you on the Skype a little while back earlier in the year, talking about your new book, Stealing from God, and as I say, in debate with David Smalley. And so it's lovely to actually have you in person. When I heard you were coming to the UK, I wanted to make sure we could connect.

Well, thanks for having me on. And, you know, I just had you on my program for your new book. Yes, indeed.

I'm flogging it far and wide. Uh-huh. It's a wonderful book, Justin. I won't let you leave without a copy as well, by the way, Alex.

But yeah, thank you. Well, it's very glad that you were able to endorse it as well, Frank. But you're here to talk about yourself really today and your ministry and obviously some of the videos and books that you've written yourself. How long have you been kind of involved in the sort of apologetics ministry you've established?

Well, we established a ministry in 2006, but I went to seminary from 1993. I was on the Moses Plan. It took me 80 years to get through. I'd been speaking for quite a while prior to 2006, but we started in 2006 with crossexamine.org, primarily to go to college campuses.

Because, as you know, the college campus is a breeding ground for skepticism and agnosticism and atheism. So we wanted to go there and present evidence as to why Christianity was true from our book, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. And some of the most popular videos actually that go on YouTube that you produce are actually some of your interactions with some of the students on these campuses.

And I think that's people like to hear the kind of the to and fro in a way. Right. And you're very good actually at thinking on the spot and responding in those situations. Well, actually, you don't have to do much thinking because you hear the same 20 questions over and over again.

I mean, there are the standard objections, which are good objections. In fact, the evil is a good objection that Alex brought up. So it's.

It's good to try and unpack these things in more than two minutes, which is why I appreciate this show so much, Justin, because, look, I can do a two-minute video, Alex can do a two-minute video, and you're really not going to cover the topic adequately, but when you have a program like this, you can really interact on it. Well, it's a pleasure to have you with me, Frank. And again, the most recent book you've authored is Stealing from God.

Do you just want to quickly give us an encapsulation of what you can find in that? Sure. The book Stealing from God, the subtitle is Why Atheists Need God to Make Their Case. The book's not about tithing Christians. That's not what it's about.

But I've noticed, it seems to me, that atheists are stealing aspects of reality that would only exist if God existed in order to say he doesn't exist. And we have an acronym in the book, CRIMES, and each of the letters stands for a different aspect of reality that I think atheists are stealing from God to say he doesn't exist. One of them...

The E in there is evil, and that's what we'll talk about today. I think, as we'll see, that evil actually shows God does exist rather than he doesn't exist. Okay, well we'll obviously be digging into that in the course of today's show. Lovely to have you back, Alex. Lovely to be here.

And I'm in awe because you're actually, and I don't know how you get away with it really, but you're midway through your exams at the moment, and yet you've made time to come in and record a discussion. And these are, of course, A-level. exams as well.

You're a relatively young person, but wise beyond your years, I think. You did a fantastic job last time you came in debating the fine-tuning argument, so I thought this would be fun to have you back in. So, first of all, exams going okay? They're going as well as they could be. I guess your exams are going fine because I was pretty much familiar with most of the subject matter already, so I could kind of get away with not revising for that one.

Well, that's Good. Obviously, I guess you interact with philosophical ideas quite regularly on your videos anyway. I do try.

So it's a good way of getting into it. And the Cosmic Skeptic channel, as I mentioned last time, only been going about a year, but already you've over 100,000 subscribers. That's right.

What's the secret to your success? Like I said last time, if I knew, I would do it again. They're all fantastic. Every one of my subscribers, at least the ones that I interact with, are incredible. Very willing to consider different ideas and I get messages from people of all faiths saying that they're grateful for a voice that isn't just Isn't just castrating religious right?

Yeah, but is going in there for a discussion not to defend a worldview But to well, I was really encouraged actually when we had the discussion last time here in the studio that you were very You you've reached out to atheists and said we need to have these discussions. We can't just you know, poo-poo and dismiss religion and the claims we need to engage in an honest conversation, which is certainly what this programme is about. Well, I mean, humour and ridicule has its place. But if you want to make a change, then you have to take things seriously, I think. Well, thank you very much for coming back on the programme today.

And part of the reason I asked you, of course, is because you regularly respond to other online videos that are out there. And, of course, one of the ones that you've responded to is one of Frank's videos. And, as I say... That video was titled, It May Just Be That Evil Disproves Atheism.

So we're going to get into that in the course of today's programme and why you disagree with Frank. There's a number of issues that you develop from the video. We won't play the audio of the video this time.

Rather, we'll let you explain for yourself. But some of the things that we're going to try and tackle is, at the outset, you say you can't disprove atheism. It's not a belief system.

We're going to be talking about objective morality. Why would it be grounded in the Christian God, not something else? You also talk about the evolutionary or social...

adaptation type of view of how morality came to be and other issues. We'll see how much time we have in the course of the discussion and I'm looking forward to a really good conversation. Well let's maybe start with you Frank just to lay out, you know, briefly at least what the case is that you're making on the video that Alex was responding to.

Right it's a two minute video and I say in the front you can't cover this whole issue in two minutes but my main point is this is that if evil exists then good must exist. And in order for good to exist, God must exist. Because by definition, what we mean by good is the nature of God. That's what goodness is.

So you can't have evil unless good exists because evil is a privation or a lack in good. Evil is like rust in a car. You know, if you take all the rust out of the car, you got a better car.

If you take all the car out of the rust, you've got nothing. In other words, evil only exists as a parasite in good. And so I think we all agree evil exists. The question is, if evil exists... then how can it exist unless there's a standard of good?

And good won't exist unless God exists. So evil doesn't disprove God. Evil may prove there's a devil out there, but evil doesn't disprove God because there'd be no such thing as evil unless there was good, and there'd be no such thing as good unless God existed.

Now, the second question there, of course, is, okay, well, if there is a good God, why would he allow these evil things to occur? That's another question which we spend a lot of time in in the book Stealing from God. But my main point is that if evil exists, God exists.

I know it sounds counterintuitive. It does sound counterintuitive to the average person. They'll say, how do you get from one to the other? But as I understand it, this is the idea of what's often called the moral argument for God.

If we all agree that real right and wrong exist, real good and evil exist, then there has to be some kind of a moral lawgiver or some kind of reference frame beyond just the... material universe that a naturalist perhaps believes. In fact, C.S. Lewis famously said that as an atheist, my argument against God was that the universe seems so cruel and unjust. But how would I got this idea of justice and injustice?

A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? You see, injustice can't exist unless justice exists, and justice can't exist unless God exists, because again, by definition...

That's what we mean by justice. And so it's your view that if an atheist wants to claim that justice and injustice exist, well, they can't really because that's just, on their framework, an illusion, a kind of just a sort of something that we've come up with as a sort of helpful way of thinking about things, but not something that actually exists objectively. Right, typically. And I think that's what Alex said in his video, that it's an illusion, that this idea that we have these moral, objective moral values is illusory. Well, let's come to Alex for this.

We'll try and sort of take the points that you raised in the video in a kind of sequential manner as far as possible, Alex. I mean, let's start at the beginning, because in the video, the first point you wanted to make was that there is this question mark around disproving atheism. That's obviously the title of the video.

It may just be that evil disproves atheism. You have a problem with that very concept to start with, don't you? To an extent, yeah.

It's not particularly pertinent to the discussion. But I think it's important to remember that, according to me, atheism isn't a worldview. And I know this is something you disagree with, Frank, but the way that people get around this a lot of the time is they'll say, Well, Many atheists do believe that there is no God, but not all atheists do.

So if you meet a person who does believe there is no God, they are an atheist. But that's not what atheism is. That's sort of a subset of atheism.

I'm what you might call an agnostic atheist. And a lot of people think that agnosticism and atheism are on the sort of same spectrum, but to me they're absolutely not. Agnosticism, Matt Dillahunty is good on this. Agnosticism is a claim to knowledge.

Atheism is a claim to belief. So to say you're agnostic is to say, well, I don't know. if there's a God, which I think is the rational position to take.

I mean, can anybody really know for sure? And all I'm saying is because I don't know agnosticism, I therefore don't believe, and that's atheism. But there are people out there who do actively believe there's no God, and those people do have a burden of proof.

I mean, people such as, he only did it on one occasion that I've seen, but Christopher Hitchens usually would say, you know, we would never say there is no God. But when talking to William Lane Craig, he said of the Christian God that he's... Quite dangerously, I think, but he said that he's in a position where he thinks he can actively say that God does not exist. And in that case, yes, he has a burden of proof.

But as far as I'm concerned, atheists in general or atheism isn't a worldview and doesn't... Isn't something you can therefore disprove in that sense. Yeah, in the sense, and also atheism, one of the phrases that I've heard you use, Frank, is on atheism, if atheism is true.

But to me, atheism isn't something that can necessarily be true or false any more than, say, veganism. You know, is veganism true? It's not really a case of whether it's true or false. It's a case of the tenets on which you are grounding this veganism is perhaps maybe you think it's wrong to eat animals.

That can be true or false. But not objectively, I'd say. That can be true or false.

But then to say, is veganism itself true or false? That doesn't make any sense. It's not whether it's true or false.

It's are you a vegan or are you not? Yeah, well, I would say that if... Are you saying that atheism is just a lack of belief in God? It is for me, as far as I'm concerned.

Okay, but then that would be just a statement about your psychological state. It wouldn't be a statement about the real world. Because this book is an atheist then, because it lacks a belief in God.

But then we're really trivializing what the word atheist means then. Because you could say any of this microphone is an atheist then, if it just lacks a belief in God. So if somebody wants to say that, okay, fine, but I don't see atheists just saying that.

What I see is atheists saying, oh, I lack a belief in God, and here's how I explain the universe. Multiple universes, evolution, quantum vacuums, materialism. Well, those are positive beliefs that need to be defended. In other words, you just can't say, I lack a belief in God, and therefore I have no burden of proof to have a conversation about why reality is the way it is.

Now if you're going to say that multiple universes or evolution or materialism or quantum vacuums explain how we got here, then it would seem to me you'd need reasons for those. Those are positive beliefs. You see what I mean?

Oh, absolutely. In certain cases. For instance, if you're talking about the variety of life, and somebody says to me that they think it was God, and I say, oh no, I can explain this for evolution.

I suddenly have a burden of proof. I have to offer some evidence for that. But atheism in general, if you're just an atheist and you're not taking part in debate, I think you don't necessarily have to justify your position in the same way. What do you do with the problem that that makes cats and rocks and microphones atheists as well?

Well, it depends on your definition. For instance, if we define a vegan as someone who doesn't eat meat, then this book is also a vegan. Right. Yes.

But isn't that the point, that that makes it difficult to understand what the content is of such a point of view? I think it... It's something which applies to humans. You can call a human an atheist.

If you want to call a book an atheist, then be my guest, because by my definition, an atheist is someone who does not believe in God. And so a book, sure, call it an atheist if you will. But then we wouldn't have any reason to converse about anything.

If you're just saying you lack a belief in God and I don't have any burden of proof to explain reality or why reality is the way it is, then we're not really having a conversation, right? Well, there's two types of atheist... speakers, you might say.

The first is people who will have a burden of proof, who come out and there are two people trying to prove their opposing worldviews against each other. In the other case, there's somebody like me who, in the face of certain aspects of Christianity, I've found to be not particularly compelling or particularly... I'm trying not to use moral terms here, to be very careful.

And so what I will do, my mission isn't... He's very smart. My mission is not to come out and convert everyone to atheism.

It's rather to say, well, here's a belief system that I don't agree with, and here's why. I'm then leaving it open. Perhaps if I'm debating with a Christian, I might say, well, this is why I think Christianity isn't true.

Now go and do your own thing. Maybe you want to be a Muslim. Maybe you want to be an atheist like me. Let me ask you this, though. Let's just say that you say you think Christianity is false because of X.

whatever that is right sure aren't you implying that non X then is true not necessarily again it's a it's a very subtle distinction between believing there is no God and not believing there is a God it sounds like the same thing it sounds like we're being pedantic but really in all honesty it is a semantic thing it doesn't particularly matter because for instance what we're discussing today the idea of evil proving or disproving God I don't think it particularly matters how you're defining atheism or Christianity because what we're trying to talk about is a particular concept. And so for this discussion, I might just be a sceptic, not necessarily an atheist, but I might just be somebody who you are trying to present a worldview to. And I'm just saying, well, let me criticise that and see if I can get some kind of response. When I've had this conversation on Twitter and on this show with people, sometimes what's emerged is that they will say, you know, they'll go with that atheism is just a lack of belief in God view. But then when you press them a bit, they will come out with other things that they do have positive beliefs about.

So that there is no such thing as objective moral right or wrong. The universe has no purpose. All that exists is matter and motion ultimately.

And those kinds of things. So do you subscribe in that sense to something like, for instance, materialism, naturalism and so on? Well, for me, it's a case by case basis. So I wouldn't call myself a naturalist. I wouldn't call myself a materialist because all of a sudden you're giving yourself.

a burden of proof. What I would say is if you pressed me to put some money, I'm not a gambling man, but if I had to put some money on either, say, Christianity or naturalism, a better explanation for the universe, I'd put my money on naturalism. And so when I have discussions like this, I will argue in that mindset. But I'm not going to say... But you're still agnostic effectively as to what exactly...

If you're talking about a claim to knowledge, absolutely. I would never be so arrogant as to say that I know... that there is no God, or I would never say that I know that there is someone up there, and I know who he is, I know his gender, I know his nature, and I know what his plan is and what he wants from me. Yeah. Well, I think we're dealing more with probability than we are with absolute certainty.

And you remember Richard Dawkins famously said this, on a scale of one to seven, where one is, I'm sure God exists, to seven, I'm sure there isn't a God. He said, I'm a six and a half. To his credit, he says, look, I can't say with absolute certainty there is no God, okay?

Yes. So we're all dealing in the realm of probability. So where would you be on that scale?

I'm in the same place as Dawkins. I'm a number six. He calls it a de facto atheist, which I think is the perfect term.

For all intents and purposes. You assume there is no God for all intents and purposes. For all intents and purposes.

What I would say is rather than I assume there is no God, rather I think that everything seems to work without the assumption that a God is there. But wouldn't an agnostic be about a 3.5? Agnosticism, again, is a claim to knowledge rather than to belief.

So agnosticism, to me... If you don't call yourself an agnostic, then I can't quite understand what knowledge you have that I don't. I mean, I don't know if you're the sort of person to say, I know there is a God.

Again, it's the realm of probability. Am I absolutely certain? No, I'm not even absolutely certain that I exist. You know, I mean, I guess I have to exist to say it.

But I mean, we could be, you know, the famous thought experiment. We could... The universe could have been created five minutes ago, or an experiment in a scientist's laboratory, and you know, we just have all these memories. Well, you've got people like Elon Musk who do think that we're some kind of artificial intelligence.

That's a discussion for another time. What I would say though is, I like to categorise it, and of course this is, again, semantics. It's just my way of categorising the world. What I would say is, if you think of four boxes, like a table, across the top you have theism and atheism, and on the side you have gnosticism and agnosticism.

You say you're not 100% sure that there is no God, so I put you in the agnostic box. Then I put you across on the theism box because you believe there is a God, and that's where you sit. You're an agnostic theist, as far as I'm concerned.

Now, you can reject that label because you might have a I know that the word agnostic carries weight, so you might not like that. I think maybe we ought to stop talking about labels and start talking about evidence. Absolutely.

Well, maybe. Let's move it on. It's been a fascinating discussion so far, talking about the definitions of atheism and agnostics and so on.

But, yeah, we should get into the meat of the subject today, which is the question of whether evil is evidence, actually, that God exists counterintuitively. That's the claim that you sort of sketched out for us earlier on, Frank. So let's move on to sort of the second issue that you bring up in your response video, Alex, which is, well, even if objective morality does exist, why would it be grounded in the Christian God and not something else? Do you want to just explain that out a bit and we'll see what Frank has to say? Well, again, this isn't...

This is one of the parts of the video that I'm not really making an actual claim, but rather I'm a genuine question. More out of interest than anything is how do you arrive at the Christian God? Although I would say that I might assume that your answer might be something along the lines of, well, this argument just proves a God and then other arguments prove the Christian God, and that is fine by me. But I wonder...

Do you think, if you say no to this, this doesn't disprove your position in any way, shape or form, but do you think that for objective morality it must be the Christian God? No, it could be another God, right? Yeah, you're absolutely right, and that's what I was going to say, that there are other arguments. You don't get all the way to the Christian God with the moral argument. Sure.

But with other arguments, I think, in my opinion anyway, you arrive at the grounding for morality as God, and that God happens to be the Christian God. Let me put it the other way, I guess, to you, Alex. If... objective morality did exist, would it at the very least disprove atheism, which is actually what the title of the video is? Well, this is a tricky thing because...

Or naturalism, let's say. Okay, sure. So we don't do that same discussion.

Perhaps. It would be compelling. I would see it as a compelling argument. If you could prove to me that objective morality did exist, I would certainly consider it a good argument.

It would, because naturalism would not be able to explain that phenomenon. Sure. I mean... Perhaps it would and we just don't have an understanding.

But I would submit that yes, we do not have in our current understanding any way. Sam Harris has tried the moral landscape. What I found is that I don't quite understand what he's getting at.

Because he says he wants to prove objective morality using science. But what he does is he proves that objectively speaking certain moral guidance leads to prosperous societies. But then that's assuming that prosperous societies... is a good thing. He makes the ought is fallacy, in my opinion.

He assumes that what is, what science describes, is something we ought to be heading for. And of course, that begs the whole question of his project. Sure, I think he's a brilliant thinker, but on this issue, I just, I cannot bring myself to agree with him.

Yeah, well, fair enough. I mean, I think we've more or less covered that issue, because obviously you're not saying this is... a wholesale argument for the Christian God, just part of a cumulative argument.

Right, exactly. And that point in the video is more for people who were watching, perhaps, who were thinking along those lines. Sure.

Well, look, that's a good point at which for us to take a quick break. I think it's time to grab the bull by the horns, Frank, and just, again, reiterate why you believe, first of all, that morality does have this objective nature to it, so that there is a real realm of moral right and wrong, good and evil, because fundamentally you're saying if... If evil does exist, as much as that may be a problem for why a loving God would allow evil, nonetheless, it's a signpost that something beyond the material world has to exist to allow this realm of good and evil to exist.

In fact, I think Alex recognizes that signpost because on his website, he rails, I think rightfully, against some of the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church, where he talks about how priests have sexually abused children. And obviously... That's a great wrong.

But my question is, Alex, if you really think that is a great wrong, why would you deny objective morality? I mean, is that really wrong or is it just a matter of personal opinion? Well, I think that we agree in one sense that evil doesn't necessarily disprove God.

I'm with you on that. What I would say is, to answer your question, objectively, no. It is a subjective thing. Morality to me...

isn't is entirely subjective why do you say that well because firstly a thing to note is that Objective morality well, let's let's talk about what objective actually means I suppose and objectivity to me If you want my definition would be to say and that it is true Regardless of human intervention regardless of human consciousness for instance the earth orbits the Sun that would be true if all humans disappeared Right every single one of them it would still be an objective fact, but to say that murder is wrong If every human disappeared, that couldn't still be wrong, surely. That would be a nonsense concept without some kind of human psychology. The only way that you could argue that perhaps it would still be wrong is if there was some kind of transcendent being.

But then you need to have that being in order to prove the existence of the objective morality that you're then using to prove the God. What we're doing is we're reasoning from effect to cause, that we have this effect known as this moral law. That is pressing on us, as you admitted in the video.

And look, videos, two-minute videos, ten-minute videos, you can't expound on all the nuances. So if this is wrong, correct me. But you seem to say that we, in fact, I think you quoted, the quote was, let me just quote you accurately on this.

Because in the video, you said this. You said, moral truths are so deeply ingrained in us that they feel like they are objective. Yes. Right.

Okay, so my question is why would you doubt their objective if they're so in deeply ingrained in well because? This is where I think Sam Harris is right in the sense that if you have certain assumptions So let's say that we could assume that Human well-being was a good thing. Well, we'll discuss why But let's say we assume that we could then say that is it is objectively true And that we should act in certain ways for instance trying not to murder people and that would then become an objective morality so because evolution has instilled within us through our through genetics a Drive to stay alive Then we can derive objective moral truths about how we should act in order and that complies with this inner nature Which I think has come about through evolution. So even if you're Even if you don't subscribe to the idea that certain moral actions such as not killing or not stealing have come about through evolution, the instinctual nature within us to stay alive causes us to think of those as objective truths. But it's a technicality.

So for all intents and purposes, you could say they're objective truths. If you grab 100 people off the street and ask them, is rape wrong? 100 of them will say yes.

But that doesn't mean it's objective. I mean, for instance, I put it to you. Would you say that chocolate is tasty?

Yeah, I would, but that's a subjective... Right, sure. Some people may not like chocolate.

It's subjective? Yeah, yeah. Oh, so...

That's a flavor. So, tar can be just as tasty as chocolate. Mm-hmm. And that's no problem, right? Right.

That's no problem whatsoever. So, when you say something along the lines of, oh, so morality is subjective, so what Hitler did being wrong was just an opinion. Well, yes.

But in the same sense that chocolate tasting is good as tar. is an opinion, it doesn't make a difference. Well, no, I think it does because it's much more obvious that, say, sexually abusing children is wrong than atheism is true. Right.

So why would you say that atheism is true in order to avoid the obvious conclusion that sexually abusing children is wrong? You already know sexually abusing children is wrong. Now, if you want to use an evolutionary argument, the problem is that undercuts everything you think.

Because if everything we think is the product of evolution, the product of the laws of physics or biology, whatever it is, then why should we believe anything we think? Forget about morality for a second. Why should we even believe that atheism is true or that Christianity is true? If we're completely, if we're, sorry, I'm suffering from jet lag here.

If our thoughts are the result of some random evolutionary process. Why should we believe anything we think is true? Well, the first thing is that evolution isn't a random process.

But that aside, it's... Well, let me put it this way. It's either directed by an outside intelligence or it's not. Sure, okay. If it's not directed by an outside intelligence, then it's random.

Yes, so? So, if it's directed by intelligence, then perhaps God exists. If it's not directed by intelligence... Why should we believe anything we think?

Because, I mean, this is the old argument against naturalism that people like... C.S. Lewis. C.S. Lewis and indeed modern practitioners like Plantinga have put forward, which, as I understand it, is effectively saying if evolution, if effectively it's meant for the propagation of our DNA, it's not aimed at us receiving true beliefs.

It's not aimed at us actually... It's not aimed at reasoning. And ultimately you could even go as far as to say that...

the actual processes of matter in motion, atoms banging into each other, electrochemical processes, those are non-rational. Why would we assume that they produce rational thinking? Because ultimately, I mean, and your argument here, I guess, Frank, is it undercuts the whole project.

It's this idea, it's almost sort of existential. You know, why should we believe anything if there's no guidance? To me, it's like asking the question, like you said earlier about, you know, how do we know that... we even exist or that the universe wasn't created last Thursday. For me, it's somewhat based on consensus.

It doesn't prove it's true. But reason is one of those things that we need to assume in order to get anywhere. In the same sense, we need to assume that we exist in order to have a philosophical discussion. Now, that's a very wise point.

I agree with you. The question is, how do we explain reason on a naturalistic worldview? Well, reason and consciousness can be explained as coming about through evolution.

The way in which we sense the world... Let's stop there for just a second, though, Alex. If that's the case, why should we trust it? Well, we don't necessarily have to. Again, it's a subjective thing.

But every single person... But that would mean reason's subjective. Yes, well, it is.

Well, if reason is subjective, then... If reason's not subjective, then how do you and I come to different conclusions, both using reason? Because we have free will.

If reason's subjective, we couldn't even communicate. If there weren't these objective, unchanging laws of logic... Well, yes, there are objective rules and tenets of reason, but reason itself is subjective in the same way that morality, you can say under certain assumptions, there are objective truths about morality.

If you have... If you have a certain assumption about reason, then yes, there are objective tenets. Well, that's what I mean. These immaterial laws of logic that aren't made of molecules, how do we explain those on a naturalistic worldview? How do you mean?

How do we explain? Why are there laws of logic? Why are there laws of mathematics?

They're a product of consciousness. And laws of mathematics are not a thing in themselves, but rather a way to explain the universe. So the laws of mathematics would not exist without human beings, so they are subjective.

But the things that they describe would on a whole so when you talk about logic when you talk about reason these things aren't ends They're means their means to understanding certain things so we use reason to understand that the earth goes around the Sun We use the laws of maths to understand how that happens, but you just said the laws of mathematics are human conceptions basic Yes, it's a language. Well. Let me ask you this Let's say there were no human beings on the earth, and they were just two rocks on the earth was it true There are two just two rocks on the earth well It turns what you mean by two I mean sure like you if In the everyday sense of the word. This is where things get confusing because, for instance, I suppose what you're asking is something similar to the question of does 2 plus 2 still equal 4 if there are no humans? And to me, the case is you have to think about what you're describing when you say 2 plus 2. So, for instance, if you're saying if there were two rocks and you added two more rocks, would there be four rocks?

Absolutely. But to say that 2 plus 2 equals 4 is like... It's a...

It's a good way to bring in the idea that mathematics is a language because in the same way that I can say but it's not An arbitrary language. Well, it is in fact language itself is based on mathematics and that's not arbitrary I'd say it's absolutely arbitrary Math is arbitrary. No math isn't but the language we used to describe it is it evolves and changes. Well, yes, but they're they're Referencing objective facts if we want to call this one book. Mm-hmm.

There is only one book here Yes. Okay, that's an objective fact. If we wanted to call it einst, like in Deutsch, that this is one book, okay, that's a different word, but it's representing the same objective fact. And if we're going to say that reasoning is objective, then there's no way we can come to any conclusions about anything. There are different ways, even within the laws of mathematics.

Did I say objective or subjective? I don't recall that. If we're going to say reason is subjective, then there's no way we can come to any conclusions about anything. But that's self-defeating, because when I say that, I'm making a truth claim.

That if reason is subjective, then we can't come to any true conclusions about anything. That actually is an objective truth claim. Well, I would say that even with something as objective as maths, there are subjective ways in which to understand it, the language we use, even though it seems that it wouldn't be the case.

For instance, if you want to find the... the roots of a quadratic equation, you can do it by using the quadratic formula, you can do it by expanding the brackets, and you get to the same answer. But the reason you're using to get there is subjective.

So the answer is a fact of nature, it's true. That would still be the answer even if humans didn't exist. But the language we used to get there and the reason that we used to get there wouldn't.

Yeah, but that's, no, the reason is objective, but there's different levels here. You have ontology, which is the study of being. Sure.

Okay. You have epistemology, that's how we know the study of being. Then you might have semantics, which is how you describe the epistemology to get to the ontology. Sure.

This can be arbitrary, but it's still tethered to objective facts. It's ultimately tethered to an objective ontology. So what are the tenets of objective reason to you?

Well, start with the basic laws of logic that there. For instance, the law of the excluded middle, things like that. Law of non-contradiction, law of excluded middle, law of inference. Law of identity.

Those are the essentials of the laws of logic. And you start with those, and then you use your sense perceptions to draw conclusions about the real world using those tools, those objective laws of logic. Exactly. They are tools.

And this is the thing that I see when we're talking about whether reason exists. Reason is a method. And so it almost...

It helps us in epistemology, but if they weren't tethered ontologically, if... If they weren't tethered to reality, there'd be no way we could know anything about reality. You're making the claim that this realm exists, that we call the laws of logic and so on, and that it really is something that we discover in that sense.

It's an element of the reality we live in. We don't determine them, we discover them. Exactly.

Whereas you're making the case, obviously, Alex, that we produce. It's something we invent because it helps us to reproduce. But you see, that's an objective truth claim right there. See, that's why it's self-defeating.

Alex is saying it's objectively true that reason is subjective. And the same applies to the moral argument as well, which is you're saying there's this realm of real right and wrong, good and evil. And you're saying that these are just concepts we invent. We don't discover them, but we invent them.

And I know many people who's part of whose journey to belief in God has been based on the fact that they came to. the view that there really is a realm of right and wrong that I discover. I no longer believe that it's all subjective. And obviously others who take your view as well, Alex.

I mean, fundamentally, is that where we do? We just come to an impasse where you say, Frank, there is real realms of, you know, these objective laws of logic and there's real realm of good and evil. And you just say, no, in my opinion, it can all be explained as a subjective. Because ultimately, I believe in objective moral good and evil.

Because for me. I see that as bit like I see racism is wrong is the same as one plus one equals two that but you say no that that racism doesn't exist when humans don't exist. I agree with you that I see it as the same to me they are both as instinctual yeah but that one plus one equals two is again it's a mathematical language but if you're talking in the set in the literal sense that one thing and another thing equals two things and yes that is objectively true but to say that racism is wrong Although it feels just as instinctively true, it doesn't have the same objective grounding in reality. Say you were living a few hundred years ago in the American South, and maybe racism is kind of just part of the culture, that's the accepted way of things, at least within the white population, let's say. Would, because that's the generally accepted, de facto, way of people thinking about it, would that mean racism is okay in that culture?

Well, it's a difficult question. I would say no. If you dropped me in that culture, I would say no. But if you had grown up in that culture, you'd probably say yes, because it's subjective. You might find people who would argue that it is, and it is a subjective opinion.

But I think now, because we have... It's not just a case that we've developed our understanding of morality. We've made it better. We now have a... But aren't you just...

You're dropping in a moral claim there. You've said it is better, which suggests it's travelling towards something, an objective standard. I do admit I'm making the assumption that we are striving for... human prosperity, which is an absolute assumption.

That isn't objectively good, but it's instilled with us within evolution. I can't explain why this thing is good, but it just, when I say good, I don't mean... At the end of the day, it's still just your preference. When I say good and evil, the words we use for me are just emotional translations of the words beneficial and detrimental. I like what Louise Antony said in her debate with William Lane Craig.

Louise Antony is an atheist, but she admitted something about... morality and atheism that I think is very insightful. Here's what she said.

This is her quote. She said, any argument for moral skepticism will be based upon premises which are less obvious than the existence of objective moral values themselves. In other words, here she is as an atheist saying, I have this sense of moral obligation that is so strong that any argument you give me for atheism or moral subjectivism will be based on the weaker premises.

than just the sense that I have that objective moral values and obligations exist. So that was my question originally to you, Alex, is why would you deny the strongest belief that you have intuitively and adopt a weaker belief in atheism or agnosticism? I don't deny it because I don't deny, like I say, as long as I do have certain assumptions and I admit that there are assumptions, I can say that I have an objective sense that these things are wrong on the assumption that I'm aiming for human prosperity.

Right, but you already pointed out that Sam Harris is begging the question on that. That is his, human flourishing. And that's a conflation of epistemology and ontology.

And as you pointed out, rightfully so, at 18 years old, he's already figured this out, which I didn't know this was 18, that Sam Harris is confusing epistemology and ontology. He's assuming what he's trying to prove. But the problem with Sam Harris's argument is he's going in there trying to show that certain things are right or wrong.

based on science. What I'm trying to do is say why people experience things as right or wrong based on science, which can be done. So I can say the reason that I feel that this is right and wrong is because of this.

What I can't say is that this is right or wrong because of this. I mean, does this mean, is it a problem for you then, telling people what they ought to do? Because there's a sense in which, you know, if you see a society being racist or treating women Or Catholic priests abusing children like you do on your website, you say that's wrong?

For me the problem has always been, for the atheist who denies objective morality, is what right do you have to tell someone else? Because they're just acting according to their subjective preferences. Well, the subjective preferences I find in these cases we often agree.

So for instance, if I meet a member of the Ku Klux Klan, we can find common ground in the sense that I might say, okay, so why is this wrong? Why is that wrong? Why?

Why? Why? Until we get to the final point and they say, well, I think that it's because my worldview is better for humanity. And I say, well, hang on, so do I. I think my worldview is better for humanity.

So let's go on the assumption that what we want is to get what's best for humanity. And here's how I think my worldview leads to that. So even people... But if they say, but I don't believe black people are human...

What do you say to that? Well, that's the thing. Then the discussion becomes trying to prove how they are. Right.

You sort of remove the need for a basis once you find out what the basis of their beliefs are, once you find that common ground. For instance, me and you agree, you and I agree that, for instance, I assume that we would agree that human flourishing is a good thing. Oh, sure. But you would say that that's because...

You have that in you because of God. I say that I have that in me because it's not just because it's in me, but because there's an objective standard of good outside of ourselves. And so when you say that we can agree that we want to have a better society, as Justin pointed out earlier, you're implying a best because in order to say something's better or worse, you have to imply a best. Well, what is that best? What is the ontological grounding of that?

Not necessarily. You don't have to have. And this is this reminds me of one of. Thomas Aquinas'famous five ways, the degrees of perfection.

There doesn't need to be an absolute perfection to have an idea of something which is more perfect than something else. And to your reference of C.S. Lewis...

No, I think there would have to be a standard of perfection or a standard that you're aiming for to say you're getting closer to that standard or further away, better or worse. It's like your reference of C.S. Lewis. You can't know a crooked line without having some idea of straight. I don't think that's true.

For instance, think of it this way. Why is it not true? It's not a case, if you're talking about good and evil.

You don't need evil to know good. If you think about, say you have a flat plane. You're absolutely right about that. Think about you have a flat plane. You don't need evil to know good, I agree with you.

You need good to know evil, though. I don't think so either. If you have a flat plane, you can see like a hill, like an indentation on that flat plane.

Now, the rest of that plane is not a valley. You don't need the valley to understand the hill. You just need the hill. in comparison to what is neutral. So you can have evil compared to what is neutral.

You can have good compared to what is neutral. You don't need the two extremes. What would be your definition of evil? My definition of evil?

Well, that's a very broad thing. But if you're asking me, again, subjectively, anything I would say that unwarrantedly elicits human suffering or animal suffering to an extent. Okay, so that would imply that it's the opposite of human flourishing.

So it's very difficult to define evil without reference to good. Not necessarily. It may be the opposite of human flourishing.

flourishing but it's also just the absence of like of no of no no suffering not necessarily good but no evil okay I don't know if I'm getting my point across very well I know I think you're both doing a great job at representing your different sides I guess the the thing that I'm really interested in pulling out there just to bring us back to that racism example is uh oh can you sort of say that race you would you say racism is has always been wrong was wrong in every culture, time and place where it was practiced in the past. Can you not actually say that if you're a subjectivist? I would say if we're assuming that human prosperity is a good thing and by good we mean best for human prosperity, then yes, racism has always been wrong.

Yes, but only on that assumption. Yes, of course, for the racist. Which is an assumption we all share, maybe not the racist.

In fact, no, no, no, the racist does share the assumption that humanity, human prosperity is a good thing. They may not. They may think my own prosperity is the best thing. I want to live a selfish life that, you know, disregards other people's preferences.

If we did have a racist. But the problem is, how do you, again, all I'm saying is, and I think you're agreeing with me, is simply that there's no objective way of sorting between these different preferences people have. There's no actual sort of thing that says this is the correct way.

We should all be. wanting this human flourishing. It's a harsh reality.

I don't like... There's no way of grounding that. It can make me uncomfortable, the idea that there is no objective, as far as I'm concerned, no objective way to... And so do you understand Frank's view here, which is he sees that as such an obvious thing that you would have to... The premises against that, if you like, would have to be much, much stronger than they are to take away his instinctive view that this is really actually an objective reality.

I understand entirely. Think about hunger. hunger is with the within all of us yeah and it is such a strong thing we like if if somebody is is dying of starvation that is all they care about it is within them but it's still a process of evolution it's still a subjective psychological experience it's not some kind of hang on let me just ask you a question about that because it's Justin pointed out in his interview with Richard Dawkins a number of years ago, which is by the way in the new book.

Unbelievable. I don't need a publicist when I've got Frank in the studio. It's a great book.

Justin rightfully said, well you tell the story Justin, about how you said he was stepping outside of the evolutionary process. I kind of had this interesting conversation in my very first encounter with Richard Dawkins and I asked him Why, you know, whether if all our morality is essentially a product of undirected evolution, whether he can really say that rape is wrong. And he says, well, I do believe rape is wrong. Now, that may be a product of my evolutionary past, but that's a value judgment I'm going to make.

And I said, but how do you make that value judgment? You have to step outside of this evolutionary process to say that's wrong. And he said, well, maybe, but it doesn't show that anything supernatural exists.

And I said, but as far as you're concerned, the fact that we believe rape is wrong is as arbitrary as the fact we've evolved five fingers rather than six. And he said, yeah, basically. And I agree on naturalism.

That is true. But most people recoil at that idea that our morality is essentially arbitrary. But in the same sense, this is what frustrates me about atheists a lot, is they'll do the same thing but the opposite. They'll look at God and they'll think of the evil. They'll listen to Hitchens talk about some celestial North Korea and they'll recoil at that and they'll say, that's a horrible thing, I can't imagine that reality, but I'm sorry.

Just because you don't like a reality doesn't make it not real. And so if there are no objective morals, then unfortunately what Joseph Stalin did in the USSR was not objectively wrong. But that's not a shocking thing to say if we're under the assumption that nothing is objectively wrong. Do you understand then why for many people the moral argument is so powerful? Absolutely.

Because they cannot get themselves to a point of view where those kinds of acts are only really about people's preferences. I don't think that's what Frank is necessarily doing. Because I think you're right that a lot of people do just recoil in horror at the idea of there being no objective standard.

But I don't think that's what you're doing. I wouldn't, I'd say that you're being cleverer than that. You're understanding that yes, this is a bad idea.

But more than that. You're saying that there's some way to prove that there is an objective reality, not just because you don't like it. I want to get beyond that, or maybe I should say underneath that, going back to Justin's point, and it's this. If you said this is all the result of evolution, you have to get outside the evolutionary process to believe that thought is true.

Because if that thought is a result of the evolutionary process as well, why believe it? But again, it's existentialism. We have to have certain assumptions.

What I'm saying, this isn't just an assumption. This is what we would call a properly basic belief. It's not just an assumption that I believe that torturing babies for fun is wrong. I think that's really true. It's not my assumption.

Well, I would say that, for instance, my belief that torturing babies is wrong is also a belief, but that's a belief based on the assumption that human flourishing is a good thing. We're going to go to a break, guys, and we'll come back to this. Fascinating stuff today. and I hope it doesn't sound too much like it's two against one in this one, Alex. Not at all.

But it's one where I've always found the moral argument a fascinating one because it does... Likewise. Whereas, I guess, cosmological arguments, they're about what's out there. I think this is very much about what's in here, our personal response to evil and good and so on. But anyway, great stuff.

Does evil show that God exists is the debate today. Frank Turek and Alex O'Connor joining me in studio. Come back again in a few moments'time and we'll conclude today's discussion.

I mean let's maybe just in the final minutes we have here gentlemen talk about one other issue you raised in your original video Alex. Morality often is blurred you say you know you raise examples of abortion and sexuality. These tend to be though questions involving humans and whether things bring harm or good along to them and there for you that showed you that ultimately the morality is human centric.

It's subjective in that sense. This is my burden of proof. This is what I'm saying by it is simply that my, my, my argument in general is to say that, again, I'm not explaining necessarily why things are right or wrong, but why we experienced them as such. And certain places where we find moral ambiguity, ambiguity is such as issues like abortion. Like you say, the problem with, if you ask me, We're not deciding here, is it okay to kill a human life or not?

The abortion debate is surrounded around, is that a human life or not? If it is, then it's wrong to kill it. And to me that's based upon the assumption of human flourishing, which again I think is instilled by evolution.

So it seems to me that this assumption of human flourishing, that can be perfectly well explained through the evolutionary process, seems to be a very compelling grounding for the experience of morality, especially when you consider things such as these moral ambiguities. where they are based upon whether or not we're harming life or not. Same thing with animals.

Yeah, again, I'd like to just reiterate that if the evolutionary process gives us our moral ideas, it also gives us all of our ideas, so why should we believe any of them? But secondly, not every issue needs to be crystal clear on morality for God to exist. You know, scientists disagree over aspects of the objective.

world, but that doesn't mean there isn't an objective world. That's a difference between, again, epistemology and ontology. We all agree there's an objective world.

We may not agree on certain aspects of that objective world in science. This is the very kind of conversation. I had a bit of a Twitter spat last week with an atheist.

We were talking about objective morality, and one of the things he said was the fact that people disagree about morality means that That it is subjective. Yeah, see I don't buy into that. So you don't buy into that?

No, not at all. Because that's often the assumption. If we disagree about something, it must be subjective. It's silly.

It can be confused. I'm not trying to say that because we disagree on things, because people disagree on things like sexuality and abortion, therefore morality must be subjective. What I'm saying is that if you want to, if you are trying to propose the view that morality can be explained through evolution, this is bolstered. by the fact that the certain things that we do have moral ambiguities on seem to align with that. We don't discuss whether or not murder is right or wrong because, and to me the reason for that is because of the fact that it involves human flourishing, human survival.

If the question is, will this act cause humans to suffer? Will this act cause a human to die in the instance of abortion? That's why that moral...

that moral ambiguity exists. And so to me, the point is basically that this is evidence of an evolutionary basis for morality. Well, no, I would say, as you mentioned earlier, an abortion, if it is a human being, you don't kill it.

That's not mysterious at all. The only question is, is it a human being? And I think scientifically we can show it as a human being. People just don't like that. I think many a times the reason people disagree on morality is not because they don't know the right thing to do.

They just don't want to do it. In fact, there are some on the other side of the pond in my country who are saying now, yeah, we know it's a human being, but that's okay. We get to kill it anyway. There are even those who have proposed infanticide. You know, Peter Singer has made the case that because a newborn baby doesn't have any of the faculties that we develop as we go on in terms of our mental abilities and so on, they shouldn't be counted necessarily as having the same kind of rights for personhood that, you know, a three-year-old would have to say.

Now, that's obviously, again... He's just shifted the issue into like, not whether we're human or not, but whether we have this quote unquote personhood issue. Yeah, this is, this is, I think, is perhaps one of the issues, perhaps, with proposing objective morality. Because what we're saying, with something like this, there's always going to be exceptions to the rule.

For instance, when we talk about hunger earlier being a natural instinctive thing within us, there are people who are anorexic, there are people who are obese. There are exceptions. But that doesn't mean...

that evolution can't explain how we experience morality. It doesn't necessarily mean that these things are right or wrong. This is the thing I think we're disagreeing on.

I'm not saying because of evolution, killing a human is wrong. I'm saying that because of evolution, the reason that we don't want to kill humans can be explained. But... do you see or maybe i'm not explaining myself clearly alex do you see that if evolution has given you your moral beliefs it's giving you all of your beliefs including the idea that evolution has given your moral belief so why should you believe it it's either random on evolution or it's designed but so i mean is that if it's designed you can trust it if it's random you can't so again if all your thoughts are the result of the laws of physics why should you believe any of them i might be talking about my hind here but is is that not similar to saying um Well, the reason that you're saying the reason I got from evolution, I also got everything else from evolution, so why should I trust it? Well, the reason that you got from God, you also got everything else from God, so why should you trust God?

Well, because God has given us the rational ability to make reasonable claims or discover truth about reality. Hasn't evolution given me the rational ability to uncover truths about reality as well? What's the difference?

Because our minds are trustworthy if they're made in the image of the great mind. Why would they be trustworthy if they're a product of random forces? Well, how do you know it's a great mind unless the great mind has instilled that reason within you to reason that it is a great mind? Because I'm going from effect to cause. By using reason.

Yes, by using reason. God gave you. So using the reason that God gave you to prove the reason of God.

That God is the ontological foundation of the laws of logic, which allows us then to discover truths about reality. What I'm saying is that you seem to be doing the same thing as I am. You're saying God is giving you this reason to reason that God.

is the most reasonable being. God has given us the tools of reason, which are objective, they're immaterial. And he's given us the free will to either follow him or reject him based upon what we learn about reality and whether or not we want to follow him or reject him.

I mean, as I understand Frank's argument, it's again, it's one of those, what's the best explanation? We both acknowledge we are completely dependent on these laws of logic, this rational capacity we all have. Is it, does it...

Can we explain such a thing on a naturalistic worldview or is it better explained on a theistic worldview? And obviously Frank's view is, yes, it makes sense that we would be able to trust our rational abilities if there is a rational mind behind the universe. Whereas in a non-rational universe, a non-rational process by which we came to be, there's no fundamental reason to assume that we are aimed at knowing.

Right from wrong, truth and falsity. You do have to make certain assumptions. Like, it does frustrate me that I will never know if I exist. Yeah.

That gets on my nerves, I have to tell you. Who's asking the question? It really does.

It really gets on my nerves. Who's wondering, Alex? Precisely.

This sort of stuff really gets on my nerves. But they are just unanswerable... Gets on whose nerves?

What do you mean? Well, precisely. These are just sort of pedantic little things. that norway i don't think they're patented something like reason i i submit that okay you could make the argument that if reason comes from evolution how can we use that to then reason about evolution sure but i'm saying is that not the same thing with god no because god is a rational creature or not creature he's the he's the ground of rationality who gives rational because we're reasoning from our rationality back using the reason that came from where well of course his ontological nature is given us these Laws of logic to discover truth.

How do you know that? Through reason. Right. You can't defend reason by reason because that would be circular.

Precisely. Right. But what we're saying is once we have reason, what better grounds it? Naturalism, which couldn't explain the laws of logic to begin with, or a mind whose very essence grounds these laws.

What you've just said is you said, okay, so we assume that reason exists. What's the best grounding? When I give you a grounding, you then say, but how do you know that reason even exists? How can you say that reason exists if it's just a process? So I could put the same thing to you.

I could say, if reason does exist, what's the best grounding? And you say God. And then I could say the same thing and say, well, if you're getting that reason from God, how can you use that reason to then prove God?

Because that's how you prove anything. Right. That's how you prove evolution. Again, again.

No, no, no, no, no. Because in evolution, everything is predetermined. There is no free will. We're just the result of the laws of physics.

No, not everything. God is omniscient. He knows the future. How can there be free will? Because knowing the future doesn't mean he's causing it to occur.

Well, is he not causing it to occur? He's the primary cause. Now we're getting to predestination evolution.

I don't know if we're predestined to get to this point. That's another show we'll have to come back to. No, no, no. I'm not a five-point Calvinist, if that's what you're saying. Not at all.

Let's leave it there for the moment. Before we open up too many more. big topics.

I think we'll have to agree to this. As we often do on this show, as we often do. Look, guys, I've really enjoyed the conversation.

Oh, it's great. Thank you so much. And you are a gracious combatant.

Alex, thank you for coming in again to do that. Frank, great, great stuff from you as well. If people want to find out more about you, crossexamine.org for Frank and, of course, the book, Stealing from God. Alex O'Connor, he can be found as Cosmic Skeptic with a K on the YouTube channel he runs. And hey, I think this will turn into a video as well at some point as well.

Perhaps, yes, I'd like to think so. Great, well thank you both for being with me on the show today. Really great to have you on.

I look forward to maybe getting you guys together again at some point in the future, but for the moment if you want to get in touch we'll be giving you the ways to do that again in a moment's time here on the show that brings Christians and non-Christians together and we'll be hearing some of your feedback to recent programmes. Great, thanks guys.

Transcript for:Debate on Evil and Atheism Perspectives

Transcript for:
Debate on Evil and Atheism Perspectives